Eulogy
by herworship429
Summary: It hit them all harder than they thought it should have.
1. Make It Count

This started out as a one-shot, but I think it might turn into a series of sorts... perhaps an exploration of how everyone's favorite SHIELD agent's tragic end effected our intrepid heroes? Yes, perhaps. The title certainly suggests that, doesn't it?

Anyways, to start with, Tony reminiscences and takes stock of his life, still managing to make someone else's death all about him, because that's just how he rolls (as the kids say. Or used to say. Do they still say that? Geez, I feel old...). I have a tendency to be overly sympathetic with his various faults, so I apologize if that bothers you. I did try my best to keep him in character at least.

I am certainly not in possession of anything even remotely resembling the rights to Avengers and all the related stuff. I'm not sure who is, but whoever they are, Tony and Phil and anyone else mentioned are theirs. Just borrowing them for my own amusement. And hopefully yours.

Enjoy!

* * *

Tony Stark couldn't remember when exactly he had become such a total narcissist. He supposed there wasn't an exact moment; more probably, it was just the convergence of events in his life that led to him becoming such a complete jerk that he wanted to punch himself in the face sometimes. On the other hand, for all that he was himself, and had always been himself, it was probably his parents' deaths that started it; it was the event by which he judged every other event in his life. All of it ended up being sorted into 'before' and 'after', and after, he had been so alone, so utterly terrified (except no one could ever _see_ that, he had an image to uphold after all), he had pushed everyone away from him. It was an irrational thought, that everyone around him was doomed to die because he was somehow cursed or unlucky, but hey, who really expects rationality from a grieving teenager, even one with such an extraordinarily rational mind as Anthony Stark? And then, once the sharp, searing pain of loss began to fade to a dull ache, he found he enjoyed the solitude. He enjoyed being left alone. Fewer expectations, fewer responsibilities when you were left all alone. No one to disappoint but yourself, and no more broken hearts if he buried his in concrete and tried to forget it existed.

But that hadn't lasted nearly as long as he liked; in the end, the kindness of a stranger took a bulldozer to his heart's concrete prison, opened him up for all the world to see, and he didn't like it. He didn't like being vulnerable; he hid it well, but he was immensely uncomfortable with the fact that his life now depended on this little machine in his chest, absolutely hated that every single time it stopped working, even for a few seconds, every time he had to take it out to change the cores, or do minor maintenance, he was just that much closer to death. Suddenly, he was dying by nanometers; suddenly, he felt like the world was out to get him in a way he had never felt before.

So he turned the metaphorical armor he'd worn most of his life into real armor, so he would never have to feel vulnerable again; he wrapped himself in a metal suit in the hopes that no one else would ever hurt him, and amidst all of his selfish fears, he discovered a way that he could somehow try and make right all of the horrors that had been, ultimately, his fault. Agent Romanoff wasn't the only one with red in her ledger. He hadn't gone into this trying to be a hero; he had just been doing what he thought was right, what he felt he owed to the victims of his misused weapons. And maybe Cap had a point, maybe he was an unreasonably-selfish ass, but he _did_ care, and he _did_ genuinely want to help.

But now, everything had changed; now, another friend who didn't deserve it had ended up dead.

If Yinsen's death had torn him up, this was worse; not because somehow he felt like he should have been able to stop it (he knew he couldn't have), but because it wasn't just someone he had known for a few days in a cave in Afghanistan. It was not just an alliance born of desperation and a mutual enemy. Coulson was... well, he was _Coulson,_ first name Agent. Irritating, idiotic Coulson, with his cliched Men in Black act, and his stupid sunglasses, always running around doing Fury's bidding, who was willing to speak his mind and stand up to the arrogant jackasses of the world. Coulson who had somehow become best buddies with Pepper (he still wasn't sure how that had happened)... God, what was he going to tell Pepper? This was all just… _not right_. It was not right to think that Coulson would never again evade his high tech security measures and come sauntering in with that self-satisfied little smirk on his face. It was not right to think that he would never try and boss Tony around again, however ineffectual it had always been. It was absolutely not right that Coulson would never be able to take him up on his offer to fly him out to see his lady friend in Portland. But it didn't matter how wrong it was, because it had happened, it _was_ happening, and for all of his genius, and all of his billions, there was not a single thing he could do to stop it. Tony Stark could do a lot of things that most people thought impossible, but turning back time was not one of them.

He felt helpless, and so he reacted the same way he'd reacted before, when he'd rounded the corner in that cave and found his friend dying in a pile of rubble. Yinsen had died for him, and so had Coulson; he had died for all of them, and Tony wasn't sure they could do what he had wanted them to do. "Don't waste your life" he could handle; but take orders from Steve Rogers?

There was a reason he worked alone; there was a reason he didn't have a full-time sidekick. He could barely even handle doing the hero thing with Rhodey, who was probably his oldest and best friend. He just didn't play well with others, and it was a fact he had accepted long ago. Now, they were all expected to get along?

But…

But he would at least try, because Coulson had believed in them, because he had been a friend, no matter what Tony had or would say on the subject, and good man besides; because he was tired of owing debts to dead friends.

But it wasn't just Coulson, or Yinsen; it wasn't just his fear that Pepper or Rhodey or Happy, or anyone else he cared about might be put in danger next. There were bigger things to worry about, and that, perhaps, more than anything else was what finally made him agree.

Because the whole world was at stake, and they were the extraordinary ones. If they couldn't save it, then what was the point of them?

He figured that's probably what Phil would have wanted.

* * *

As always, reviews are nice if you feel like leaving one. If not, no biggie, but hopefully you at least enjoyed it.


	2. Lists

Hey, look, it's officially a series! So, an interesting note (and please, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong), but I'm pretty sure we never see Bruce and Coulson formally introduced onscreen. Therefore, this might seem a touch odd, given that Bruce really never knew Coulson, etc. As for the stuff in parenthesis, I just kind of think that that's how Bruce thinks, that a thought will randomly occur to him, and his mind is going off in tangents every which way... I also think that under the mild-mannered, scatterbrained professor exterior lurks a smartass Weasley twin just waiting to be let out. Which might be even more dangerous than the Hulk, especially since Tony has the other one hiding in his psyche...

Also, I've never had Shawarma (in fact, I had no idea what it was until I asked someone I know from New York, and then googled it for good measure), so I cannot comment on what it tastes like. It might just be the fact that they all just finished fighting off an alien invasion, but no one (except Thor) seems particularly enthusiastic about it in the after-credits scene, so that was the basis for the bits about that.

Let's see... uh, usual disclaimers, Bruce and Coulson and everyone else isn't mine, etc. etc.

Anyways, hopefully y'all like it.

* * *

Bruce Banner had a problem. It had been plaguing him for some time; for years, in fact, ever since the "accident" (which, really, hadn't been so much an accident as a miscalculation on his part), he'd been dealing with this condition. It was a debilitating one that was not currently recognized by modern medicine. It had no name. It was, nevertheless, a killer.

He was a morose, sarcastic, self-deprecating SOB, but all things considered, his outlook on life could have been worse, if only he would stop blaming himself for things that really weren't his fault. It was a habit he'd gotten into the first time he woke up after the Other Guy made an appearance and found out that he had killed someone. For the life of him, he couldn't remember the man's name. All he knew was that he had been an innocent bystander, a hardworking stiff with a family, a man who did not deserve the end that had come to him. Ever since then, Bruce had made a point of finding out the names of every single one of the Hulk's victims. He would look in newspaper articles, check online obituaries, hack into government databases (when he had access to a computer and was feeling cocky enough), even take painful strolls through the places his alter-ego had left in ruins to ask what had happened, so that he might learn who had died.

The brevity of his list always surprised him, but then, the Hulk didn't often _try_ to kill someone. He caused a great deal of damage wherever he went, but in the end, he was a caged animal, striking out in perceived self-defense, his goal always to get away. Most people were smart enough to oblige the monster; mostly, the ones who weren't probably had it coming to them anyway. Regardless, Bruce was only sure that it was all, ultimately, his fault. And he had since discovered that once you got into that habit, you suddenly start finding ways to blame yourself for _everything_. He found himself working up bizarre reasoning for innocuous, stupid things, things for which he was not even remotely to blame; everything was suddenly nothing but the butterfly effect, with him playing the role of the butterfly, helpless to do anything but inflict his cruel jokes on the unsuspecting world.

Coulson's rather gruesome, if heroic, death at the end of Loki's scepter was no different. He hadn't even known about it until after they'd closed the portal, after the Chitauri had been defeated and Loki locked up once more, awaiting cosmic deportation to face Asguardian justice. They had been sitting there in the Shawarma place Tony had been so eager to visit, eating cheap, mildly-disgusting food (well, except for Steve, who had fallen asleep), and he had stupidly asked what had happened after he broke the Helicarrier and fell to Earth. There had been much awkward silence all around, the others (except Steve, who was still asleep) exchanging looks, and they were so obviously trying to have a psychic confab to decide how much they should tell him (he refrained from pointing out that without psychic powers, it just wasn't happening. He figured they had enough to deal with without him being a smartass). Finally, Thor put the remains of his sandwich down (of all of them, he seemed to be the only one who was actually enjoying the meal, leading Bruce to the conclusion that Norse gods would eat pretty much anything), and told him (in his usual manner, with the grave, self-important tone and antique diction) that, among many, many other agents, the names of whom he didn't know, "the Son of Coul" was dead (it took Bruce a full minute to figure out who Thor was talking about). Loki had killed him, they said; Thor had been there. The others had been busy. No one could have saved him. This was the reason they all came back and decided to give this whole Avengers thing a try. Barton delivered most of this information in his blunt, matter-of-fact way, his face a mask of impassivity. It was like he was reciting his grocery list. Bruce silently marveled at the man's seemingly-effortless control, and then he stopped trying to act like he was interested in eating any more of his food (it was a middling grade of terrible to his tongue, and he had eaten a lot of questionable things over the past few years, so he felt like something of an expert on the subject).

He knew it was irrational to blame himself for Coulson's death. He also knew it was ridiculous that he was suddenly so upset over the death of a man that he hadn't even known (he literally hadn't ever been formally introduced to Phil Coulson. He hadn't known his first name was Phil until someone at the table had told him). He didn't know anything about him. He could only infer that he had been an excellent and well-liked agent, who had been good at his job and hadn't had much of a life outside of it. He had been dating a cellist who had moved to Portland, Tony mentioned. He seemed to be one of Fury's right hand men. Barton, Thor and Natasha had thought a lot of him (despite his being the original president of the Captain America fan club, which Natasha obviously still thought was the dorkiest thing ever. Respect for the dead was all well and good, Bruce supposed, but she was a pragmatic soul). Steve woke up and caught enough of the conversation to get a really sad, distant look on his face, which led Bruce to believe that he had also been somewhat fond of the agent. There was something about trading cards drenched in blood, and Coulson wanting them to soldier on in his absence, to avenge his untimely death.

Bruce could only think that if he hadn't lost it, if the Other Guy hadn't played right into Loki's hands, this Agent Phil Coulson might still be alive. And from the looks on everyone's faces, they'd probably rather have Coulson back than him (not that this surprised him at all).

That was okay. They were probably right. If he'd been able to, Bruce would have gladly traded places with the dead agent. But, as he had told Natasha back in the shack in Calcutta, he didn't every time get what he wanted. So maybe he couldn't trade places with Coulson, but he could do right by the man. He could maybe give this team thing a go (everyone else had, and if Tony Stark could do it, he could too). He could maybe even work on trying to control (no, that wasn't the right word, no one could _control _the Hulk)… well, maybe he could work on convincing the Other Guy to cooperate more often.

In the end, though, Coulson's name still went on his list. (Some things never change, even if maybe they should.)

* * *

Liked? Didn't? Reviews are nice, if you are so inclined :)


	3. Family

So, Cap was supposed to be up next, but my brain just wasn't feeling it, so y'all get Natasha instead.

As usual, I don't own anything that belongs to Marvel/Disney/whoever.

Enjoy...

* * *

It was times like these that Natasha Romanoff wished she could be just a little more human. She was not normally given to sentimental displays of emotions, and as she had told Loki back on the Helicarrier before all hell broke loose, love was for children.

But there must have been a time when she wasn't this cold facsimile of a human being; before the first in a long line of black-clad men had come to steal her away, unmake her and then forge her again anew, a time when she was just a little girl who loved to dance. She could still remember, occasionally, in flashes that came to her at night, or at the sight of some random _thing_ that shouldn't have felt so familiar, but it did.

She had déjà vu a lot. That was okay; she could ignore it, and no one else had to know about that. But emotions? She kept those under high security, locked away in an impenetrable vault in the back of her mind. An impenetrable vault that, she had recently discovered, was not nearly impenetrable as she thought it was. It had all started with this stupid Avengers Initiative thing. Fury's ridiculous pipe dream, suddenly brought back from the place where bad ideas go to gather dust. Banner had been absolutely right when he had said that they were a time-bomb; Natasha only played along because she was a SHIELD agent, and this was what SHIELD agents did when they disagreed with a command and their superior ignored the complaint.

But then again, in the end she and Banner had both been proved wrong. _Fucking Coulson…_

He had laid down his life for this mad belief that they could actually work as a team, that Fury's ridiculous pipe dream was more than that, and she hated that he had been proved right. Because suddenly, it wasn't just Natasha and Clint, it was Natasha, the 'Incredible' Hulk, the most irritating billionaire on the planet, the god-alien, the man out of time, and Clint, and this was not how she had intended to live the rest of her life, as a part of this bizarre... family that was starting to form.

She didn't do teams. She had tried to explain this to Fury when he first brought up her being a part of this idiocy. He had given her that look, the one that said he was going to pretend he hadn't heard that, because it was a stupid-ass thing to say to your boss in this business. She had let it go after hearing that the Council had scrapped the project anyway, and there hadn't been time for the argument she wanted to start with the director after Loki's bloody, inelegant arrival. And after the attack on the Helicarrier…

She had taken it personally. Not just Clint, but all of it. That Loki had been able to fool them all, that they had fallen for what seemed so obvious in retrospect; that he had managed to keep them all blind to what he really had planned. She had taken it as a personal slight that this man-god-whatever, who was so obviously off his rocker, had orchestrated this scheme and agents she worked with, agents she knew and respected had ended up dead for it. Coulson hadn't deserved what he got; he may have been a little annoying, with his stupid trading cards in the middle of all of that madness, but he had been a good agent, and a good person. He had never judged her, not once, though she was fairly sure he knew more than most of the other agents did of her sordid past. He had been brave, in that automaton sort of way, knew when to question his orders and when to keep quiet, did his job quietly and diligently, even when he was scoffed at, and he never complained about the jokes made at his expense. That a good man and a good agent had to die to get the 'Earth's mightiest heroes' to get their asses into gear was a little ridiculous. How were they heroes, when one of their own had to die to that they could stop arguing and do their jobs?

But they'd done them, in the face of impossible odds, even if they had only won by the skin of their teeth and an unexpected display of stupid, honorable courage from Tony Stark, of all people. By rights, it shouldn't have worked out the way it had.

But it had worked out in their favor. And Natasha realized sitting around the scuffed table in the little restaurant Stark had insisted on trying, that maybe this was okay with her. These people were undoubtedly crazy, but maybe so was she. Maybe given how she was this cold facsimile of a human being, this was the closest thing to a family she was ever going to get.

She looked around the table, at Steve who was asleep in his chair again, and Clint, who was staring at the door and looked like he was about to follow their fearless leader's example any second; at Thor, who was consuming his sandwich with impressive gusto, and Tony, who was slowly putting food in his mouth with an expression that suggested he was regretting this mission, but he wasn't about to admit defeat just yet; and then at Bruce, who had stopped half-heartedly picking at his basket of unidentifiable fried things and was just staring at it with this morose sort of expression that might have tugged at her heartstrings (what few she had left) just a little. He was probably feeling guilty for Coulson's death. Sure, they all were.

But looking around at her new posse of monsters, madmen, gods and anachronisms, Natasha smiled.

Coulson's sacrifice hadn't been in vain after all. And she had gotten something out of it she never thought she'd have again.

Abruptly, she picked up a fork and the plastic glass of water sitting in front of her and began tapping at it. The others blinked and stared at her for a long moment while she tried to figure out what to say, but then Bruce caught on. He picked up his own glass and held it out. Clint stopped staring at the door and held out his glass. Tony followed suit. They apparently did toasts on Asguard, because Thor did the same without the least bit of hesitation. He poked Steve in the side, and after a moment of panic and confusion, he realized what was up and held out his glass too. As one they clinked the plastic together, and Natasha spoke.

"To Phil."

* * *

Reviews are nice if you are so inclined :)


	4. And Life Goes On

Once more, Cap is evading me, and Thor has now joined him, so the Hawk is up. Um… to be honest, I had no idea how to write him. Barton doesn't get enough airtime to really get a handle on his character in the movies, so I kind of went off the exchange with Natasha after his "cognitive recalibration"… namely, how putting an arrow through Loki's eye would make him feel better, and that she seems to think this sounds like something he would say.

Oh, and this chapter had me bumping up the rating to M for Clint's potty mouth. I'd have censored him, but he seems like the kind of guy who curses constantly when he's upset (in his head at least), and who am I to tell him he can't say the f-word as many times as he likes?

As per usual, nothing that belongs to Marvel or whoever is mine, etc.

* * *

Clint Barton wanted to hit something. He wanted to beat something to a wet, muddy pulp, and then fire a charge arrow into it and blow it into oblivion for good measure. If someone had had the gall to come up to him and ask what was wrong, he wouldn't have known what to tell them. Of course something was fucking wrong; _everything_ was fucking wrong. He'd been made a slave against his will by a sideshow freak with a glowing spear; said sideshow freak had used him to wage war on his own people, several of whom had ended up dead; and then Greasy McBonkers had tried to take over the whole fucking world with his army of creepy-ass aliens and their evil space whales.

Seriously. Fucking space whales.

He'd have laughed his ass off if someone had come up to him and told him this story, because shit like this didn't actually _happen_ in real, sane worlds. Except now he was fucking living it, and he wasn't sure he was equipped to deal with any of this shit. Nat was right, monsters and magic were not exactly what SHIELD agents were prepped to handle. Not by a fucking long-shot. And yet, here they were.

And there he'd been in the middle of a battle in a world gone insane, standing back-to-back with an alien prince, the billionaire who runs on batteries, a gigantic green monster, and Coulson's wet dream come back to life, and what the _fuck_ were he and Natasha supposed to contribute to any of this? But they had. They'd kicked the alien motherfuckers right back to whatever dimension they came from alongside their new super-friends. They'd won. Just like Phil had said they would.

Damn it, that was just one more fucking horrible thing about the past three days. Of all the agents he could have gotten killed, it had to be goddamn Coulson. The guy had been irritating sometimes, sure, but he'd also been the kind of agent who never left a disaster scene until he was sure everyone else was out of danger, the kind of guy who followed orders when they made sense, and asked questions when they didn't. Everyone loved fucking Coulson. And now he was gone, along with however-many other agents Barton had gotten killed during his brief career as an evil henchman.

He'd tried to talk them into letting him put an arrow through Greasy's eye now that they had the assclown in custody. He figured that if he just stabbed him a little it wouldn't kill him and he'd be that much less able to hurt anyone or escape. Hulk looked like he would have liked to see that, and Natasha had just shrugged noncommittally. He was pretty sure that Stark wouldn't have minded one lick, though it was kind of hard to tell, 'cause all he seemed to be able to think about was trying shawarma. But then Cap started preaching about the merits of mercy, and Thor had just given Barton this look that said "I like you alright, but push me and I _will_ fucking kill you", and seeing as Thor was, well, Thor and all, he let it go. He was a pretty smart guy, if he did say so himself, and he was certainly smart enough to avoid a smack-down with a guy who could almost hold his own with the fucking Hulk.

Besides, ye olde god of thunder had pulled Barton aside and promised that Greasy would face justice that would be a fair balance to the weight of his crimes, and it would likely be something that would irritate him constantly for the rest of his existence. It wasn't the same as putting an arrow through his eye, not nearly, but Barton supposed that he could live with that.

And at least one of the agents who had lost their lives because he was compromised got their due, in the end, though he had to admit, it surprised him a little that Nat was the one who held up her glass first. None of them had to ask what she was toasting. She didn't even have to speak. _Here's to you, Coulson_, Barton thought wryly as he held up his glass, _I guess you were probably the only who could get us all to fucking work together, sorry you had to die to do it._

And he was. But unlike Natasha, he didn't dwell on shit like this, as a rule. So he toasted his dead friend, and ignored his dinner, and as soon as everyone else finished ignoring theirs (and Thor finished devouring his), he'd go back to the Helicarrier and get some fucking sleep.

And then he'd get his next target. And life would go on. It always did.

* * *

Review if you like. Actually, I'd be interested in hear what y'all thought of how I wrote Barton (constructive criticism, please...)


	5. Vintage

Wow, it's been a while... sorry about that. But Steve has finally started cooperating, mostly. Fury makes an appearance. And... yeah, so, the usual, the characters aren't mine, they are property of Disney or Marvel or whoever. But I hope y'all enjoy.

* * *

As soon as the blood-spattered trading cards went sliding across the table, scattering from the pile and coming to rest directly in front of him, Steve Rogers felt it. That hollow, cold, burning sensation in the pit of his stomach, the same feeling that had overcome him when it finally hit him that Bucky wasn't coming back. That moment had been a million years ago (well, more accurately, seventy), but Steve knew he would never forget it for as long as he lived.

He had failed then, too.

Fury's words were lost in a flood of memories and regrets, though he caught the general idea. They wanted a team. A team like his team back in the war, a team of impossible people who would do the impossible on the behalf of a helpless humanity. But that camaraderie was something that couldn't be forced, didn't Fury understand that? Just because humanity needed them didn't mean they could perform. It didn't mean they could get past the gaping canyons that stood between them. It didn't mean they could learn to trust each other.

The central case for his internal argument was sitting on the other side of the table, his back half turned to Steve, staring off into space. Steve was pretty sure his expression hadn't changed once since he had pulled the helmet off just as Fury made the announcement about Agent Coulson over the ship-wide comm. But then, this wasn't the first time that he had wondered if the Tin Man had ever really had a heart.

Steve tuned back in as Fury finished his monologue, and both of them looked up as Stark abruptly bolted to his feet. He stood stock-still for a long, tense moment, and then he stalked off of the bridge without a word.

"Well," Fury let his chin drop to his chest with a heavy sigh, "It's an old fashioned notion."

There was a long, drawn out moment when only the sounds of the SHIELD agents in the background quietly going about their tasks could be heard. Fury made another round-and-a-half of the table in that time, and had resumed staring out of the display windows on the front of the Helicarrier.

"Is he always this selfish?" Steve asked abruptly, his right hand balling into a fist that he pounded against the table. It left a dent. He looked up apologetically to find the strangest expression on Fury's face. It was something akin to sadness, or maybe regret. Whatever it was, this nameless emotion, the director's voice was full of it when he finally spoke.

"Coulson was a friend, whatever Stark might have said to the contrary," Fury's gaze returned to the view, "Stark doesn't have very many friends."

"Gee, I wonder why," Steve muttered under his breath.

"He likes losing them even less," the director went on, pointedly ignoring Steve's comment.

"I didn't like it much either."

"So maybe you should try a little sympathy," Fury's voice was hard, and it took Steve aback. He had been under the distinct impression that Fury didn't like Stark all that much.

Fury sighed heavily, shaking his head, "I showed you his file, and we both knew Howard when he was alive. Of course, he _isn't_ Howard, and no matter how much is in them, those files don't really tell you much about a person. Take Agent Romanoff. Looking through her docket, you'd probably expect to meet a hardened, heartless assassin with absolutely no regard for human life. Is that how she struck _you_?"

Steve was forced to concede that no, that's not how Natasha struck him at all.

"People aren't always what we expect them to be," Fury continued, his hands locked together behind his back, "Being rich and famous and an unparalleled genius doesn't mean bad things can't happen to you, or that those things hurt any less just because you've got a fancy mansion and a vault full of money to console yourself with. Stark can lay on all the charm he wants, but he hasn't exactly had the easiest time of it. Not in a very long time. And I know it's difficult for you to see it, but he does care, and he does want to help."

"You're right about that," Steve stood up, "I don't see it."

"To be honest, I hope he doesn't have to show you," Fury sighed heavily, "You said he wouldn't be the one to lay down on the wire for the other guy, but you're wrong. He has. More than once, without a thought to his own safety or a single reservation. And every time he has to do it, the likelihood of him coming back from it gets smaller and smaller. You don't like the guy, fine, but the world _does_ need Tony Stark. And you can't do this without Iron Man. So, for all of our sakes, could you at least _try_ to get along with him?"

A tall order for anyone, but Steve had done his best. And it had worked out alright in the end, hadn't it? Just barely, but it had. Stark had proved Fury right, and proved Steve wrong; and they had all proved Coulson right, managing to pull it together at the last minute to save the world and as much of New York City as they could. And sitting around amidst their bizarre parade of superheroes… well, it was a little like having his team back.

Steve hadn't known Phil Coulson, not really, but he figured that the agent would have been proud of them.

He just wished he had gotten around to signing his stupid trading cards.

* * *

Reviews are always appreciated if you feel so inclined (and thanks to all those who've reviewed this and my other stories while I'm at it!)


End file.
